Lifetramp: Be someone else for a day

Boy, I was so excited when that search box appeared with the words "If you had a chance to experience another lifestyle…"

With no hesitation at all, I typed TRUCK DRIVER, and hit "search." All my life, I've said at one time or another, "if I could just take a couple years off and learn to drive a big rig, I'd love to see what life would be like." I've gone so far as to inquire with various trucking schools, but never more than that. It's just too different, too wildly far away from who I am and what I do now. How would anyone understand that I left a high-paying tech career with "no heavy lifting," as they say, to become an over the road driver? Would I be happy? I wish I could know.

So of course I typed TRUCK DRIVER and hit search. And in a split second, anticipation turned into unsurprised disappointment. Of course it said "Whoops. Looks like we couldn't find any mentors matching your search."

Dead end. Sure, there's a place to enter a suggestion, which naturally just results in an empty-sounding "you're awesome" and a vague promise to "try and get someone," but no CTA beyond that, or opportunity for further engagement.

Digging around a bit more, there's a sidebar that can be expanded to show some locations. Clicking on various cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, etc., the minuscule number of mentors that do exist on the site are web designers, UX specialists, and the like. I'd wager that most of the people looking at the site already do things like that. Not much lifetramping to be had there.

A concept like this could be amazing, if it had a wide network of mentors in all walks of life. The ones that are there now, though, seem to be variants of "hip tech worker" or "hip artisanal ex-tech worker." I hope the creators can get a lot more variety, and most importantly, a lot of mentors.

I'll be watching with my fingers crossed. Still wish I could ride along with a truck driver for a week.

Can I just say, I wish I thought of this first? Here's a startup that focuses on connecting people with what they love to do. Of course people will be willing to pay for the opportunity. The business model relies on fundamental human passions and cultivating meaningful relationships. This is what "the daily grind" really should be about: doing what you love with those who believe what you believe. (Simon Sinek, anyone?)

Anyway, I hope it sees more global availability soon. If Lifetramp is really all about doing good for people, I expect it will be quite successful. My only concerns are that A) the price may be inhibitive, and B) the quality of the mentors may be low. Solve those two problems, then integrate with mobile, and I bet it'd be well on its way.

Funny, my friends built this company two years ago (and called it lifeswap). It was well received, but the challenge was high turnover amongst mentors due to the work involved--it's much harder to mentor someone than just rent your spare room on airbnb, and probably pays worse. In the end they discovered that the only way it would work is as a headhunting firm for tech companies, and decided to build a new company instead.

Something rubs me the wrong way about that site. How come all these jobs are all artsy / techy. Where are all the thankless blue collar jobs? I see game designer, guitar luthier, and something called "coffee evangelist" but no janitors.

The whole thing seems like something on Portlandia.

Nice idea, but I can't figure out how to see everyone in a particular place. I'd like to look up interesting people near me, regardless of what they do.

I find it quite interesting that most hacker-type people would like to try out a life without computers and/or with much more physical activity. Someone here said truck driver, someone else said lumberjack -- I searched for 'bicycle messenger', my geek friends usually followed similar patterns.

Evidently porn star didn't have mentors either. Have to admit, if you're going to put this up on the web, most every 18-21 year old guy I know is going to put that in. Perhaps you need to put in a few "keep dreaming" on certain terms.

> Agriculture is the most important job on the island. Every person is taught it and must live in the countryside, farming for two years at a time, with women doing the same work as men. Parallel to this, every citizen must learn at least one of the other essential trades: weaving (mainly done by the women), carpentry, metalsmithing and masonry. There is deliberate simplicity about these trades; for instance, all people wear the same types of simple clothes and there are no dressmakers making fine apparel. All able-bodied citizens must work; thus unemployment is eradicated, and the length of the working day can be minimised: the people only have to work six hours a day (although many willingly work for longer). More does allow scholars in his society to become the ruling officials or priests, people picked during their primary education for their ability to learn. All other citizens are however encouraged to apply themselves to learning in their leisure time.

(from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utopia_(book))

This is going to be huge. This is basically AirBnB for activities, while managing to not make people feel like they are merely booking a tour.

I always wanted to be a lumberjack. Leaping from tree to tree, as they float down the mighty rivers of British Columbia. The Giant Redwood. The Larch. The Fir! The mighty Scots Pine!

But they can't find any mentors matching my search. :(

Interesting concept, kind of like what we see on TV (I have seen a couple of programs which use the exact same idea before, so the concept per se is not new). I guess one of the key issue is when you have too many mentors on the platform, it will be very hard to get visibility if you want to be one among the most popular categories.

I have seen some unfortunate descriptions (someone describing themselves as "growth hacker", omg...), I hope they exercise some curation in there.

Awesome idea! but you didn't have any mentors who are fighter pilots or painters yet ;p

Unfortunately I'm not sure how well this concept will work for non-freelance occupations. I doubt employers would want randoms coming in to shadow their employees and risk potential exposure of IP / confidential information, but I could be wrong.

If that issue can be resolved though, it could be a fantastic way to covertly job search or look for schools.

I think a larger focus needs to be placed on location based navigation. I get that it's primarily poland right now, but the drill down options for location are abysmal: http://lifetramp.com/search?place=Chicago-Miami

I would be MUCH more willing to hook up in my state than other countries, etc.

I've long had the idea for a web series called "What Do You Do?" that would be similar to this. Each episode would feature the host doing the job/becoming the person of a new occupation (like Dirty Jobs but not just for dirty jobs).

Personally, I'm fascinated by this. I would love to experience the jobs of others, just to learn about them and their story.

I've always wanted to do something like this, and I'm going to be in Poland (where most of the mentors are) for the next couple of months, so I'm a little bit excited already.

edit: Or maybe not, you need to be invited before being able to contact a mentor.

edit 2: I have been invited, thank you Lifetramp

I've thought about this over the years, and if I could experience another guy's life/job for a day; It always comes down to Hugh Heffner--when he was younger, before AIDS.

I am surprised by the name. The word tramp has a negative connotation for me. I would be somewhat concerned about it being blocked at firewalls or showing up in my address history.

I put in astronaut. :(

This is a great idea. Similar to mholt's comment, I think it needs a foothold in the sf bay area to really take off.

Great idea. Terrible name. Awesome execution graphically. Will play around some more later. Keep iterating!

I got way too excited about this just to find out that you actually need an invite to book a day.

This kind of thing just makes me happy. I hope it takes off, and wish the best to the founders.

It would be great for children who have a narrow view of their career possibilities.

I know what I'd do.

Billionaire.

I'm working on a similar idea which I hope to launch in a week of so. It's not the same, but dang, it's in the ballpark.